


The Only Sweetness

by orphan_account



Series: Agents and Ministers of Grace [4]
Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: F/F, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-28
Updated: 2015-01-28
Packaged: 2018-03-09 11:38:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3248294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What probably happened just after Peggy finished bashing a hole in the wall and hiding the vial it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Only Sweetness

Angie’s recognizable pounding hammered on the other side of the door.  Peggy briskly placed the picture back onto the wall, calling out over her shoulder, “Just a moment!”

She opened the door to find Angie looking curiously past her, into the apartment.  “What’s going on in there, English?  You havin’ a party and didn’t invite me?”

Peggy smiled at her, took a deep breath, and, after running over everything in her mind, decided it was safe for Angie to come in, and stood aside to let her pass.

The moment the door clicked shut, Angie was wrapping her arms around Peggy’s waist, kissing the back of her neck, sighing, “You got that music up so loud, Peg, I bet we could make all kinds of racket and nobody would notice.”

But Peggy stiffened and grabbed Angie’s wrists.  “I’m sorry, Angie, just…”

Angie instantly let go.  “Ah, I knew it was too good to be true,” she began to mope.

Peggy turned around and clasped both her hands.  “No, no,” she assured her, “it isn’t that, it’s just… a friend, or someone I thought was a friend, told me something tonight that was very difficult to hear, and I’m…”  She trailed off.  How could she ever explain?

Angie, nimble as she was, adjusted yet again.  “Aw, honey, I’m sorry.  Wanna talk about it?”

Peggy sighed.  “I don’t know if I can.”

Angie put her arms around Peggy again, this time simply being comforting, gentle.  This time, she was just giving care that she intuitively understood that Peggy wasn’t getting anywhere else.  Peggy sighed heavily and leaned into her, wrung out and sad.  Angie couldn’t fix her, but at least she didn’t have to be alone just now. “Wanna just lie down, then?  Not to fool around or anything.  I’ll just hold you if you want.  You can decide to tell me or not tell me.  Whatever you want.”  She stepped back and nodded toward the bed.  “C’mon.”

Peggy nodded after a moment, and then she turned the music down low, and curled up under the bedspread, still in her dress, with Angie curled around her, feeling the soft cashmere of her Angie’s sweater on her skin as Angie threw an arm around her waist.  She felt so broken, so angry, so compromised.  Every shard of broken heart that she’d carefully interred had been unearthed, and there was no-one she could tell the whole truth to.  

After a long quiet, she finally began, “So, I’ve been doing… favors… for someone that I shouldn’t have been.”

She felt Angie’s brow furrow.  “Like… someone at work?”

Peggy paused.  “No, an old friend.  But… I’ve been using my position at work to help them, because I thought they were a friend.  And, come to find out, I’m not so sure they are after all.”

“You’re too nice, Peg,” Angie observed, squeezing her a little.  “If you let people walk all over you, they will.  Us girls have that problem a lot.”

“But I don’t, not normally,” Peggy protested.   _I’ve commanded platoons in battle,_ she wanted to tell her, _and just the other day I knocked out three men with my bare hands and one more with a brick_.  “It’s someone I’ve known for a long time and I’ve learned that they’ve been lying to me about something.”

“Well… what is it?”

Peggy sighed, pulling Angie’s arms around her.  “I can’t get into the details, but…”   She shifted, turning onto her back so that she could see Angie’s face.  “I lost someone, in the war, someone very close to me,” she began.

“A boyfriend?”

“Something like that.  He was very special to me.  We… he was the only person ever, ever, who knew everything about me.”

“Everything?”

“Everything.  Even…”  She gestured helplessly.  “...even this.  There’s only ever been one other girl besides you, a French girl, but he knew about it.”

“Did he mind?”

“Oh, not at all.  But… it was more than just that.  He was…”  She started to well up, remembering the last words they exchanged over the radio as his plane was going down, remembering that awful feeling of knowing she was going to lose him, of saying goodbye.  “They call everyone a hero who gets hurt or killed in war, but he was.  He gave his life, he deliberately sent his plane down, to save people.”

“His squadron?” Angie guessed.

“All of us,”  Peggy answered, her voice catching.  “He gave his life to save all of us.”  She couldn’t help it.  She started to cry.  “I’m sorry…”

“Jeez, Peg,” Angie whispered, squeezing her tightly and kissing her forehead.  “It’s alright to cry, honey.  I bet you haven’t let yourself cry about it since the day you got the word about him.”

She’s right about that, Peggy realized.  “He made me a better person.  He made me want to be stronger, for him.  And…”  She wiped her eyes, trying not to be frustrated with herself for sobbing all over Angie.  But she couldn’t make any words for a little while after this, so she just turned toward Angie and let herself sob into her chest for  few minutes until she calmed down.

“What was his name?”

Peggy sniffled.  “His name was Steve.”

Angie kept gently rubbing Peggy’s back.  “Alright... so what was your friend lying about?  What does that have to do with Steve?”

Peggy shook her head.  How to explain without explaining?  She was so tired of this game.  “I found out my friend has… has been hanging onto … some of Steve’s things… Things I would have wanted, or wanted to at least know about.  And then lying to me about it. And…”  She stopped.  “Ugh, there’s more, but I really can’t stand to talk about this anymore.”

Angie kissed Peggy’s forehead.  “I understand.  It must be really hard.”  

Peggy worked on calming down, on relaxing into Angie’s embrace.  She let her breath follow Angie’s breath, burying her face in Angie’s chest, burrowing her cheek against her soft sweater.  She sank into her softness, her flowery perfume, grateful to have someone holding her.

“I know I can’t compete with Steve-”  Angie began.

“Stop,” Peggy ordered, suddenly finding her sense of authority.  “You shouldn’t even think about that.”

Angie looked startled, and Peggy realized it probably had come out sharper than she meant it to.  Her look softened, and she kissed Angie’s chin once.  

“Angie … It's been a bit rough for me lately.  Friends have been betraying me, colleagues have died, bad news has been the word of the day, nearly every day.  I hate my job, I don’t even know why I’m still doing it sometimes.  My life is an assortment of bitter pills just now, and you're the only sweetness in it." She said this as if realizing it for the first time.  "You’re the only person… the only anything, really… that makes me feel unadulterated happiness.  You’re the only person I trust.” She kissed Angie's mouth, once, lingering for a moment, before continuing.  “Steve would want that for me, I think.  You’re not competing with his memory.  You’re doing exactly what he would want you to do.”

Angie kissed her softly, careful not to seem like she was trying to start anything more.  “I hope so.  I hope I can be even a little bit what you need.”

They kissed some more, Peggy intermittently cried a little, they kissed a little more.

“I know you got a real stiff spine in there, English,” Angie declared after a long quiet filled mostly with Peggy's uneven breathing.  “I’m glad you can cry on my shoulder-”

“Not really technically your shoulder,” Peggy interrupted, mumbling into Angie’s breast.

“-whatever.  But you’ve gotta get your back up, now, honey.  Don’t put up with this jerk.  Don’t put up with those jerks at your job, either.  You’re my gung-ho gal. So lemme see Tough Peggy. Lemme see London After the Blitz Peggy.  You can be sad with me tonight if you need to be, but tomorrow, I want you to get up and go take the bull by the horns, huh?”

Peggy smiled tiredly.  “Was that a pep talk?”

“Yeah.  You feel peppy yet?”

“Give it a moment.”

She kissed Angie again, and fell asleep for a while in her arms.  She wasn’t sure how long.  She woke up in the middle of the night, moonlight splashing through the lace curtains onto the bedspread, Angie kissing her on the cheek and whispering, “I better go back to my own room, honey.  We don’t want people to talk.  Sweet dreams.”


End file.
